Hill Heat

• Thomas C. Baloga, Vice President of Engineering, BMW of North America
• Steven Chalk, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
• Dr. Kathryn Clay, Director of Research, Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers
• Anthony Greszler, Vice President of Government and Industry Relations, Volvo Powertrain North America, Member, 21st Century Truck Partnership Executive Committee
• Dr. John H. Johnson, Presidential Professor, Michigan Technological University Chair, National Academies Committee to Review the 21st Century Truck Partnership

Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, will deliver remarks on the path forward for addressing global warming, including legislation and other actions.

The Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) invites you to a briefing to examine the energy, environmental, economic, and national security issues associated with liquid transportation fuels derived from coal. Coal-based fuels were first developed almost 100 years ago. Germany used liquid coal fuels from the 1920’s until World War II and South Africa has had an active liquid coal industry since 1955. Desire to reduce dependence on foreign oil has driven interest in developing alternative transportation fuels including liquid coal in the United States, which has the largest known recoverable coal reserves of any country in the world. Liquid coal, however, raises significant questions about costs, benefits, and impacts in terms of energy security, climate change, land and water resources, and public health. Speakers for this event include:

• James Katzer, PhD, Independent Consultant; Former Vice-President, Technology, Mobil Oil Corporation
• Sasha Mackler, Research Director, National Commission on Energy Policy
• Sarah Ladislaw, Fellow, Energy and National Security Program, Center for Strategic and International Studies
• Matthew Wasson, PhD, Director of Programs, Appalachian Voices

The potential impacts of these fuels on U.S. and global greenhouse gas emissions have been a dominant concern. Unless the carbon dioxide emissions generated by the processing of these fuels can be permanently sequestered and stored, the greenhouse gas footprint of these fuels is estimated to be approximately twice that of conventional gasoline. Options to reduce life-cycle carbon emissions are being explored but are presently uncertain. How national security, climate change, and local environmental impacts should be weighed and integrated into public policy decisions regarding these fuels remains controversial and unclear.

This briefing will review these multiple issues to help guide a full and informed comparison of different policy options regarding alternative transportation fuels. Key questions to be addressed include:

• How are liquid coal fuels produced? What are the factors driving and limiting their development?
• What is the range and scale of impacts associated with the production and consumption of these fuels?
• What are the energy, environmental, and national security consequences of developing these fuels?
• How should different costs, benefits, and impacts be factored into federal policy decisions?

This briefing is free and open to the public. No RSVP required. For more information, contact Jan Mueller at (202) 662-1883 or [email protected].

This briefing is the first in a series on alternative transportation fuels. Subsequent topics will include oil shale and tar sands, biofuels, and electricity. Details will be posted at www.eesi.org/briefings as they become available.

The hearing will address potential domestic legislative provisions to prevent the leakage of jobs and carbon emissions from the United States to countries that do not take similar action to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

• Jack McMackin, Jr., on behalf of The Energy Intensive Manufacturers Working Group on Greenhouse Gas Regulation
• Marty McBroom, Director of Federal Environmental Affairs, American Electric Power
• Eileen Claussen, President, Pew Center on Global Climate Change
• Richard Morgenstern, Senior Fellow, Resources for the Future
• Paul Cicio, President, Industrial Energy Consumers of America
• Margo Thorning, Ph.D., Senior Vice President and Chief Economist, American Council for Capitol Formation

• David Hayes, nominee to be Deputy Secretary of the Interior

This week’s nomination hearing will be the second time around for Hayes, who previously held the deputy secretary position at the tail end of the Clinton administration. Hayes was confirmed by a unanimous Senate vote to serve as second-in-command at Interior under former Secretary Bruce Babbitt.

During his previous stint at Interior, Hayes worked on negotiations for habitat conservation plans under the Endangered Species Act, acquisition of old-growth redwood forest in Northern California and introducing new water management approaches in the West.

He also helped to settle longstanding American Indian water and land disputes and establish the Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado, according to a biography provided by Interior.

Recently, Hayes oversaw the energy and natural resources transition for President Obama. Also, he has been partner and global chair of the Environment, Land and Resources Department at Latham & Watkins. In addition, he served as chairman of the board of the Environmental Law Institute and as a senior fellow at the World Wildlife Fund and the Progressive Policy Institute.

Hayes’ name was floated as a candidate for Interior secretary. The option was met with resistance from some environmental groups, which noted that he has worked as a lobbyist for several groups, including Sempra Energy and the San Diego Gas & Electric Co., and that as a lawyer he represented the Chemical Manufacturers Association and Ford Motor Co.

The Committee will conduct a legislative hearing to examine Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-NV) Clean Renewable Energy and Economic Development Act, draft legislation regarding siting of electricity transmission lines, including increased federal siting authority and regional transmission planning.

• Jon Wellinghoff, acting chairman, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
• Tony Clark, commissioner, North Dakota Public Service Commission
• Reid Detchon, executive director, Energy Future Coalition
• James Dickenson, managing director, JEA
• Joseph Welch, president, ITC Holdings Corp.
• Michael Morris, chairman, American Electric Power
• Graham Edwards, acting president, Midwest ISO.

E&E News:

Reid’s bill is similar to a national clean energy grid plan introduced last month by the Energy Future Coalition and the Center for American Progress, which is supported by a range of stakeholders including the American Wind Energy Association, ITC Holdings, Sierra Club and Natural Resources Defense Council.

Under Reid’s bill, the Energy Department would have less than one year to identify “zones” where renewable energy could produce more than 1 gigawatt of electricity or where there was insufficient transmission capacity to carry that much electricity from renewable energy generators in two of the nation’s main grid systems: the Western and Eastern Interconnects. The third system is contained within Texas, which has already implemented a renewable energy zone and grid planning policy that was part of the inspiration for Reid’s bill.

A broad coalition of stakeholders – including state regulators, utilities, environmental advocates, transmission owners, grid operators and energy developers – would then have one year to plan a transmission roadmap for each of the two interconnections to integrate these renewable energy zones into the current grid and to create a cost allocation system for companies to understand how they will recover their investment. A transmission surcharge on all load bearing entities within the two systems would be developed and implemented by FERC to cover up to $80 million for the costs of the planning.

Companies would then apply to FERC for authorization to build projects within the “green” transmission roadmap. If states fail to participate or develop an interconnection wide roadmap or formulas to pay for the projects in one year, FERC would have the authority to step in.

• Victor K. Der, Acting Assistant Secretary, U.S. Department of Energy
• Mark Gaffigan, director of the natural resources and environment team, Government Accountability Office
• Sarah Forbes, senior associate, climate and energy program, World Resources Institute
• Robert Finley, director, Energy and Earth Resources Center, Illinois State Geological Survey
• Larry Monroe, senior research consultant, Southern Co.

A House Science and Technology subcommittee will explore the troubled FutureGen advanced coal project Wednesday, days after Energy Secretary Steven Chu said he hoped to proceed in a “modified” way with the project that his predecessor abandoned.

The review of FutureGen, a prototype that would capture and sequester carbon dioxide emissions among other goals, is part of a broader Energy & Environment Subcommittee probe of DOE programs to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases from burning coal, which currently provides half the nation’s electric power.

The hearing will “inform members about near-term and long-term strategies to accelerate research, development and demonstration of advanced technologies to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions from new and existing coal-fired power plants,” according to the committee.

But questions about FutureGen – a joint federal-industry project that was slated for construction in Mattoon, Ill. – specifically will probably take center stage.

• Robin Nazzaro, director for natural resources and the environment, GAO
• Phyllis Fong, inspector general,Agriculture Department

House appropriators will delve into the state of the Forest Service on Wednesday, likely focusing on the escalating cost of wildfires and the agency’s fire management plans.

The session is one in a series of pre-budget hearings designed to get assessments and input from federal watchdogs on the operation of agencies overseen by the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee.

One inescapable topic is how to fix the Forest Service’s budget problems due to wildfire costs. In recent years, the agency has run out of firefighting money and had to transfer hundreds of millions from its other programs to cover the wildfire costs, causing major disruptions to its other priorities.

The Obama administration wants to create a new contingent reserve fund for catastrophic wildfires. The fund would be tapped only if federal agencies exhaust regularly budgeted money for wildfires, which would continue to be fully funded based on the 10-year average cost of fire suppression.

The discretionary reserve fund would include $75 million for Interior agencies and $282 million for the Forest Service for firefighting. The fund would be tapped into after the $1.1 billion appropriated 10-year average runs out.